In Iran, more abuse of unjustly imprisoned journalists

New York, June 7, 2011--Iranian authorities continue to punish unjustly imprisoned journalists when they demand basic rights. They also retaliate when these journalists speak out about their mistreatment and the substandard conditions in prison, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

"Apparently,
it is not sufficient for the authorities in Iran to be the world's leading
jailer of journalists," said CPJ Middle East and North Africa Program
Coordinator Mohamed Abdel Dayem. "Prison, security, and judicial officials
regularly harm and punish journalists who demand their rights or shed light on
rampant prison abuse. These journalists should not be in prison in the first
place but while they are there the authorities have a duty to ensure their
safety and well-being."

Mehdi
Mahmoudian, a freelance journalist and blogger who is serving a five-year
prison sentence at the Rajaee Shah prison in Karaj, about an hour west of
Tehran, has been suffering from medical complications since late May, multiple
reformist news websites have reported. The reformist news website Human Rights
House of Iran (RAHANA) published on May 8 a letter from Mahmoudian to
Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, detailing torture at the prison.
The letter also highlighted drug abuse, forced and consensual sex among prison
inmates, verbal abuse and other forms of degrading treatment, and coerced
confessions there. The RAHANA report states that the letter was written
in September 2010, but was made public only recently.

The
reformist news website Kalemereported on May 14 that following publication of
the letter, prison authorities transferred Mahmoudian to solitary confinement
for 10 days and banned him from having visitors for three
months. Mahmoudian embarked on a dry hunger strike soon after, along with
a handful of other journalists and political prisoners, the reformist news
website Rooz Online reported.The journalist's health has sharply
deteriorated during his incarceration: his lungs collapsed and he has developed
epilepsy in 2010, CPJ research shows.

Houshang
Mahmoudian, Mehdi's father, told Rooz Online that during his hunger
strike, his son's condition had deteriorated so much that he "didn't
recognize him. He has lost so much weight, I couldn't recognize my
son. I was waiting for him to come; and only when he waved at me did I
realize that this is my son who has come to look like this." Mahmoudian and
the two other journalists, Issa Saharkhiz and Kayvan Samimi, ended their hunger
strike on Monday after a number of clerics called for them to do so, news
websites reported.

In
2010, Mahmoudian was found guilty of "mutiny against the regime" for
his role in documenting complaints of rape and abuse of detainees at the
now-defunct Kahrizak Detention Center in 2009. Mahmoudian is one of many
journalists who have been transferred to Rajaee Shah prison, infamous for
housing many violent criminals who abuse drugs and spread communicable
diseases, CPJ research shows.

In
another retaliatory move in Iranian prisons, on Thursday, guards repeatedly
bashed the head of imprisoned journalist Massoud Bastani into a wall, Kalemereported. Bastani worked for the reformist
newspaper Farhikhteganand the reformist news website Jomhoriyat
until his arrest in July 2009.The assault took place when Bastani's visit with
his family members went a minute longer than the allotted time, according to the
same report. On the same day, a tearful Massoumeh Maloul, the journalist's
mother, told the U.S.-funded Radio Farda that
"Massoud told the prison guard to allow him to say goodbye for a few more
minutes. He slightly pushed the soldier aside with his hand when the soldier
grabbed him by the collar and kept hitting his head against the wall."

In the
same interview, Bastani's mother recounted how the journalist, in a brief visit
after the assault, told her that he thought that he had a concussion.
Journalist Mahsa Amrabadi, Bastani's wife who was imprisoned in 2009 herself, told the International Campaign for Human Rights
in Iran on Sunday that her husband called home and told her that he had been
sent to a hospital in Karaj for a CT scan, X-rays, and other medical tests. She
added that Bastani told her that he felt weak and disoriented.

Bastani,
also being held at the Rajaee Shah prison in Karaj, is serving a six-year
prison sentence for "propagating against the regime and congregating and
mutinying to create anarchy." He was arrested in July 2009 when he went to
a Tehran court seeking information about his wife. Amrabadi, arrested with two
other journalists in June 2009, was released the in August.

And in
a third instance of intimidation, Mohammad Davari, editor-in-chief ofthe
reformist news website Saham News who is serving five years in prison on
charges of "propagating against the regime," and "disrupting
national security," was summoned to the Evin Prison Court in late April, Kaleme
reported. Davari was interrogated about
published statements and open letters that he signed. Prison and intelligence
officials asked him to publicly deny having signed the statements attributed to
him or face a new criminal case and trial, according to Kaleme.

Davari has signed a significant number of statements and open letters for
political prisoners over the past year, CPJ research shows. Prisoners inside
Ward 350 including Davari believe that judicial and intelligence authorities
use summonses, threats, and new interrogations to create more limitations and
deprivations and ultimately longer prison time for political prisoners.

In November 2010, CPJ honored
Davari with its International Press Freedom Award.